‘hell too good’ | 

Sisters recall nightmare of abuse at hands of vile father jailed for extra seven years

‘I hope he dies a horrible death’

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TWO SISTERS who were sexually abused by their father have said ‘Hell is too good for him’ – after the remorseless predator was given another seven years in prison for brutally attacking his eldest daughter.

On Thursday, paedophile dad Oliver Berry (66) received a consecutive seven-year sentence on 25 sample counts of abusing Sharon Berry – to follow a 13-year jail term handed down to him three years ago on 103 counts of the sexual abuse and rape of daughter Jennifer.

Breaking her silence for the first time after the court case, Sharon – who was supported by Jennifer throughout the four trials it took to bring Berry to justice – said of her father: “He has no empathy, he has no remorse, there is just no good in him.

“Hell is too good for him, I hope he dies a horrible, horrible death.”

Over a two-day sentencing hearing at the Courts of Criminal Justice, former Irish Defence Forces soldier Berry sat impassively in the dock as details of the horrific campaign of abuse he perpetrated on his daughters were detailed.

Prosecutor David Perry told the court that Berry had pleaded not guilty to all 25 sample counts on the indictment but on June 9, following his fourth trial for the offences, the jury returned a unanimous verdict on each counts.

The counts were sample counts he said, reflecting sexual assaults on Sharon that occurred as often as three times a week between July 31, 1980, and July 30, 1986 – between her seventh and 13th birthdays.

Speaking after the case, Sharon said it had taken four trials to get justice but it has been worth it in the end.

“He denied it every step of the way,” she said. “He played on my mental health on every occasion – claiming I wasn’t competent to give evidence.

“There is no guilt in that man at all. He is pure evil.”

Sharon said that after she and Jennifer came forward several family members, including their own mother, Susan Darby, had turned their backs on them.

“She just turned her back on me and that was hard,” she said.

Sharon said in the years since the abuse she had tried to take her own life on a number of occasions.

“I have regretted that I couldn’t protect Jenny. That kills me … because I love her,” she said.

“The hardest thing for me was that I had to leave Jenny and my brothers, because they were only babies at the time, behind.

“I missed growing up with my family.”

Sharon grew up living in No.3 Newpark, Kinnegad and lived there until she fled her home aged 15.

Ms Berry said Sharon was often the subject of physical abuse by her father, who would hit her with his fists and sometimes a fishing rod.

Sharon had told the jury, he said, the first occasion on which she was sexually abused occurred when she was just seven years old and that it continued until she was aged 12.

During those years, Sharon estimated that she was sexually abused by her father on up to three occasions per week – at a time when her mother was frequently out of the house working evening and afternoon shifts.

The first occasion on which Sharon was abused occurred after Berry called her upstairs to his bedroom, closed the door and locked it before removing his trousers and underwear.

The accused then got his daughter to lie on the bed beside him, rubbing her leg with his hand while he masturbated.

He asked her to touch him but she refused out of fear and after about five minutes he let her go.

The abuse continued on from there in her parents’ bedroom – escalating to Berry touching his daughter’s chest and vagina while he masturbated.

On some occasions, he also asked Sharon to take his penis in her mouth but she never did that.

On one occasion, Berry abused Sharon in the bedroom she shared with Jennifer by getting into her bed alongside her and rubbing himself against her rear before later leaving the room.

Sharon had told the jury that at a certain stage Berry had bought a green van and began driving her down to a canal bank near the family home called Darcy’s Bridge.

After driving down a laneway, he would get Sharon into the back of the van and abuse her at this location.

The court heard Sharon ran away at the age of 12, catching a bus and then a ferry before arriving at Victoria Station in London.

There, she was picked up by the police and returned home to Ireland, after which the sexual abuse ended.

She fled her home at the age of 15 in 1988 and resided in England before reporting the abuse in May 2009 to Detective Garda Andrea Coonan.

The court heard that Sharon came forward to Gardaí after learning that her father had a child with a new partner and she was concerned this child would suffer the same abuse she had.

Berry was charged on September 15, 2011. Three subsequent trials collapsed before he was successfully convicted on July 9 of this year.

During this period, Berry was also tried and convicted on 44 counts of the sexual assault and 59 counts of the rape of Sharon’s younger sister Jennifer.

That trial heard how Berry was 25 years old when he first abused seven-year-old Jennifer and that on occasion he made her wear her mother’s underwear as “a prelude to rape”.

In one particular year when Oliver Berry was out of work, Jennifer was raped most days when she returned home from school for lunch.

The court heard also that Berry continued to rape his daughter while she was pregnant with her first child as he told the victim ‘the damage had now been done’.

Berry was sentenced to 10 years in prison after the 2018 trial but, after the DPP appealed the sentence to the Court of Criminal Appeal, it increased his sentence to 13 years in 2020.

In Sharon Berry’s victim impact statement, read out in court this week, she recalled leaving Jennifer behind her at Berry’s mercy in Newpark as the most difficult thing she has ever had to do.

“When I left home for good when I was 15, I left my sister Jenny behind,” she said.

“I suspected that she had been abused too.

“But I was practically a child myself and I had to get out of there.

“That has and still does affect me that I couldn’t protect her.”

Addressing the court on behalf of Berry, Mr. Maurice Coffey defending said his client ‘doesn’t recognise the jury’s verdict and maintains his innocence.’

Sentencing Berry to 7 years in prison, Ms Justice Patricia Ryan said the aggravating factors in the case included the serious nature of the offences which occurred over a considerable period, the injured party’s age and the fact Oliver Berry was the victim’s father.

This meant, she said, that the offences represented an ‘enormous breach of trust.’

Ms Justice Ryan said the maximum sentence in respect of the first four counts was two years on each and 10 years on each of the latter 20 counts.

She said the court, taking all matters into account, would impose a global sentence of seven years and, given the gravity of the offences, would order that the sentence be served consecutive to his existing sentence.

“It will start,” she said, “at the lawful termination of the sentence handed down by the Court of Appeal.”

Oliver Berry will now remain behind bars until March 17 2035. He will be 77-year-old on his release from prison.